Just Your Typical RENTfic
by Shelby
Summary: Mark loves Roger, Roger loves Mark, Collins is making coffee, Angel is a pawn in author plot schemes; you know you've all written one.


A.R.: Okay. I've got two fanfics in the works right now. A really angsty one: "Snakes and Snails and Puppy Dog Tails", and a humorous one: "Saving Private Cohen or: Men Of No Honor." I'll tell you, my brain needs a break. So hear it is folks. My break. 

Apologies: Anybody I've offended. Please accept my humblest expressions of remorse. 

Disclaimers: I own nothing but the laptop I type this on. 

Just Your Typical RENTfic

It was a lovely day in New York City. The sun was shining. The birds were singing. The grass growing in cracks in the sidewalk was green and lush. A fresh and pleasant breeze flowed through the streets, maintaining the pleasant 78 degree weather. 

The date is some undetermined time after Take Me or Leave Me but before Contact. 

Mark trudged down the street, camera in hand, wasting film on shots of the street rocking up and down. He'd forgotten to turn the stupid thing off. Despite the pleasantly warm weather, he still wore that coat and scarf. Why? I don't ask. If having Markie wear that thing year-round is good enough for all the other authors, it's good enough for me! 

Amazingly, Markie didn't notice the uncomfortable heat of his attire at all, on this lovely day, as he swatted unhappily at a cheerful bluebird singing Zippity Doo Da by his head. The poor animal dropped to the ground unceremoniously and laid there, a pitiful little ball of blue fluff. 

Turning into his apartment building, Mark marched up the stairs to his loft and opened the door, slumping down to the couch. Suddenly, an amazing inter-dimensional space warp occurred and Angel and Collins popped into the living room/dining room/kitchen/den. 

True to his character, Angel surrendered all regular human emotions to become the amazing "SUPER ANGEL: Champion of Comfort" and instantly crossed to offer Mark words of sage advice and support all the while thinking to himself: "I wonder whether I should wear the RED shoes or the WHITE ones tonight…" 

Collins just stood there making coffee, since that's all he's there for anyway. He makes the coffee and occasionally spouts one-liners. It's not until AFTER Angel's dead that he assumes Angel's former position of the love child of Miss Cleo and Doctor Love, surrendering all regular human emotions to become "SUPER COLLINS: Champion of Comfort." 

"Oh Markie! You look so miserable and sad!"

"Oh Angel," Mark wails in a pathetic breakdown of masculine emotion-immunity, "I'm miserable and sad!"

"You can tell me Mark! Are you hopelessly in love with an impassive Roger who only has eyes for Mimi and can't help the uncontrollable urges to kiss him and hug him, all the while being a substitute for his absent mother as he slowly but surely tries to destroy himself?" 

"Angel, I'm hopelessly in love with an impassive Roger, and he only has eyes for Mimi. I can't help the uncontrollable urges to kiss and hug him. And all the while I'm trying to be a substitute for his absent mother as he slowly but surely tries to destroy himself!" Another wail, and Mark propels himself into Angel's arms, sobbing with heedless abandon. 

Collins calmly picks up the coffee and dumps it on the author's head for repeating herself three times in the same fanfic. Then he resumes his position as the coffee-maker. 

Mark threw his arms around Angel, howling melodramatically into his shoulder. "Oh Angel, I'm so lonely! Won't Roger ever love me? Ever since Maureen left me I haven't had anyone I've truly loved but him. I need him, I want him, I can't live without him. And now he's with Mimi and my whole world's crashing down around me! I've even been cutting myself/doing drugs/drinking/dressing up as Aretha Franklin and doing drag shows every weekend!(All of which are evidently suitable channels for Mark's grief.)"

"It's okay Markie. Roger really loves you, he's just afraid of his feelings." 

Meanwhile, one floor down 

Roger sat on the bed he shared with Mimi. Mimi was out having an affair with Benny. Normally this would have incensed him to start a large and terrible fight with Mimi that would result in her running into the arms of her drug dealer and him shutting himself upstairs in his old room with that stupid guitar. But today, he was too emotionally worn out to do anything, so he just handed her a condom and told her to have a good time. 

The reason he was in such emotional turmoil was simple: Markie. He really did love Mark, he was just afraid of his feelings. 

Upstairs, once more, Collins dropped hot coffee on this poor, innocent author's head. "That's _four_." 

Back downstairs:

Roger sighed, and laid his head in his hands. Looking at the piece of paper in his hands he heaved his shoulders and looked out the window despondently. He had written a song for Mark, but he feared he would never get to sing it to him. 

Oh Mark I really think you're a lark 

_So good to meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee._

_You kept me from shooting up. _

_When I puked you brought a cup. _

_You always drinking that stupid teeeeeeeaaaaaa._

_I wish you could be my man,_

_We'd go to the beach, and you'd get a tan. _

_Your eyes are so dreeeeeeeaaaaammmmyyyyyyy._

_Much better than Miiiiiiimmmmiiiiiii._

_Can't live with ouuuuut you! _

_I would never douuuuubt you! _

_Oh MAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRKKKK!!!_

_(Followed by a bad rendition of "Musetta's Waltz" on the guitar)_

He'd spent all night writing it. He was actually quite proud. 

Finally, he folded the piece of paper up and put it in his pockets, before leaving the apartment and walking upstairs. Might as well go there, there's nothing to do here. 

Back Upstairs 

Mark's sobs were cut short by the knocking of the door. Cleaning his face with his sleeve, he opened it to find Roger standing there, all pretty and blonde and unshaven like that. Mouth open, Mark just stood there for a moment, reveling in the beauty of his best friend and former roommate. 

_"Oh, what light through yonder window breaks! It is the east, and Roger is the sun! Arise fair sun, and kill the envious moon!"_

Mark, realizing what he was saying, clapped a hand over his mouth and gasped. Roger just stared at him. 

"Oh Roger! I didn't mean-"

"What are you _saying_?"

"I don't-Oh-Woe is me!" Mark leaned back and rested the back of his hand against his forehead like he saw Donna do on _Lives and Lovers_ on the Soap Channel. "Roger, I can't hold it in any longer! I love you, damnit! I know we're both guys and you've got that rock star image to maintain and you're in love with Mimi but I do! I love you so much my poor heart is breaking every time I see you! My world stops when you're not there! I'm starved for your affections! Kiss me!" 

And with that, Mark threw himself at Roger, arms tightening around Roger's neck and their lips meeting in a beautiful and passionate kiss that involved firecrackers and cows mooing and people cheering and little naked babies flying around singing "Love is a Many Splendered Thing", while in both the men's minds rushed the thoughts of them running hand-in-hand on the beach, drinking cocoa in some secluded lodge somewhere in Switzerland, and having hot, wild sex in the back of a minivan. 

Of course, the more reasonable thoughts that DIDN'T go through their minds were things like Mark sitting in a doctor's office being diagnosed HIV+ and Roger laying in a casket with flowers and a suit that he'd never wear if he was still in full possession of his facilities. 

Angel and Collins stood by the coffee pot watching, because, well, they didn't have anything better to do with their time. 

Honestly, Angel was just happy that he was alive in this fanfic. Although for the most part the only reason most authors kept him alive was to get Mark and Roger together. And that kind of pissed him off that he didn't have a fandom existence outside of matchmaker. And that led him to storm out of the loft in an angry huff while Collins continued to stand there and sip his coffee because he really honestly didn't care what Angel did, he was gonna die in a few months anyway. 

Unfortunately for Angel, the author yanked him out of the stairwell and plopped him back into the loft next to Collins. 

When the kiss ended, Roger pushed Mark away and wiped his mouth, disgusted. Even though he actually _wanted_ to be with Mark, he knew that that wasn't how the plotline went, so he got really mad and really sexy. 

"I am disgusted! I love Mimi! I could never love you you pitiful excuse for a human being! You albino geek! Leave me! I will no longer stand for your faggoty evil-ness! I can no longer be friends with you! Never contact me again!"

And spinning around, he made his dramatic exit by storming out the door, slamming it behind him, and subsequently tripping and falling down three flights of stairs. 

Mark turned to Angel and Collins with tears in his eyes, and when he saw he was gonna get absolutely no help there, fled to his room in tears. 

Angel, still pissed, was sipping his coffee. Then, deciding that it was gonna be at least three and a half minutes until Maureen and Joanne arrived, they put more coffee on and slipped into the bathroom for three and a half minutes of fucking like bunnies. 

Three and a half minutes later, Maureen burst through the door and made a beeline for Mark's room. Joanne entered two seconds later, and looked over at Angel and Collins, who were sitting on the counter in the kitchen/dining room/living room/den drinking coffee solemnly. 

"Markie! I heard! It's all okay! I'll have an affair with you while I'm still going out with Joanne so that everyone can be happy and she and I can have something new to argue about!" 

She came out a minute later, melodramatically crying. "Mark's slit his wrists! He's slit his wrists!"

With abnormal calm, Collins called the ambulance as Angel and Maureen burst into tears and Joanne dragged Mark's bleeding body onto the couch. 

A few minutes later, they were all sitting in the waiting room of the hospital. Don't ask me how these things happen so fast, I'm just following the trend. 

In another jump of inter-dimensional space warp, Roger popped into the waiting room and looked around at all the people. 

"Where is he?" 

"In there." Collins pointed solemnly to what looked like a set from ER. Heedless to the protests from nurses and doctors alike, he barged into the room and sat down in a chair conveniently located right next to Mark's hospital bed. 

Don't ask me how, but Mark was paler than normal, and his eyes opened wide as he gazed into the rough, masculine face of his true love. "Roger," he whispered, really getting into the ER theme. "Roger, I'm sorry-"

"No, no beloved! It's me who should be sorry! I hurt you when I truly loved you! I don't deserve you, my little cabbage of beauty!" 

"But Mimi-"

Roger gestured with his hands to indicate that he really didn't care for Mimi at all. "She came down with some unexplainable disease and just died, so I'm free! Please Mark! I need you to comfort me in my time of need by having meaningful sex and baking me cookies!" 

"Oh Roger!" 

The conversation went on like that for a while. A lot of "peach" and "muffin" and "little honeybunch" pet names arose, and through supersonic hearing, the rest of the bunch in the waiting room could hear everything that was going on and were appropriately affected by the touching scene. Maureen and Joanne wept and held each other. 

"Oh Honeybear, I'm sorry I'm so possessive and non trusting!"  
"Oh Pookie, I'm sorry I carry on countless affairs while you think I'm grocery shopping." 

Angel and Collins were sitting there, clasping hands and gazing into each other's eyes. 

"Oh Angel, I love you so much, even if you are going to die in a few months!"  
"Oh Collins, I love you, even if I am sick and going to yell at you a few minutes before my unhappy and untimely death!"

And poor Benny stood in the doorway, sad because everybody makes him out to be the bad guy and all he wants is a friend, because of his miserable and agonizing loneliness.

THE END!!


End file.
